“Ocean's 16” Hop Bus, Claim Powerball Prize

How lucky can one man get? Apparently, very lucky...and so were the 15 other men and woman in Ocean County that pooled their money and purchased one of three winning Powerball tickets last Wednesday.

The 16 Ocean County Vehicle Services Department employees who dubbed themselves the "Ocean's 16," a nod to the "Ocean's Eleven" series of movies, validated their winning Powerball ticket on Monday for a portion of the $448 million jackpot.

The lucky group, made up of seven men and nine woman hopped on a bus and rode to lottery headquarters where they posed with an oversized mock check made out to "Ocean's 16."

The check was in the amount of more than $86 million, the lump-sum value of their ticket. Each will get about $3.8 million after taxes, lottery spokeswoman Judith Drucker said.

One of the winners, Sue Nickel, told NBC10 that she plans on rehabing her home, which was badly damaged by Superstorm Sandy last October
.

The rest of the winners have yet to come forward, but Lottery officials plan to introduce them to the public at a news conference Tuesday in Toms River

The winning ticket was sold at an Acme in Little Egg Harbor Township
. Phil Weber, the director of Acme Supermarkets, said Thursday that the store will donate $10,000 in gift cards to local "Sandy" charities.

A suburban Minneapolis man, project engineer Paul White, claimed one of the Powerball prizes last week.

The holder of the third winning ticket, sold in South Brunswick, N.J., has not yet come forward.

 

Copyright AP - Associated Press
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